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Forum:Has anyone considered that Gordon Freeman might be...
I was playing Half-Life, and I was thinking of reasons why Gordon Freeman might be silent, and I came up with a (what I think is interesting) theory. That theory is that Gordon Freeman is a person with autism. It sounds far-fetched, and I am in no way poking fun at people with autism, but hear me out. 1) A very common attribute in people with autism is that they excel in a specific area, often in the field of mathematics or sciences, hence Gordon being a brilliant theoretical physicist. 2) Another common trait is extreme social challenges, which explains Gordon's (apparent) inability to speak. 3) Throughout the series (but mainly in HL2), people are constantly complimenting, congratulating and generally being extremely nice to Freeman. Of course, this is well-deserved but if you think about it and look at some of the stuff people say, it kind of makes sense. For example, at the beginning of HL2, Dr. Kleiner asks Freeman to pull the switch that activates the teleportation device. It's a simple task, but once it is completed, everybody congratulates Freeman as though he has done something incredible. My theory is that people do this to make Freeman feel good about himself, and because they feel sorry for him. 4) This one's a little out there, but another characteristic that is found among people with autism (thought not as common as the other 2 that were mentioned before) is the extreme use of logic and emotional detachment at all times and in all scenarios. This explains Freeman's ability to kill hundreds of people without showing any signs of remorse, as well as his ability to not react in any way to (MAJOR SPOILER FOR HL2: EPISODE 2) Eli Vance's death. Others have suggested this theory (I've found about 3 other people), but their ideas are not exactly fleshed out. There is one thing that I want to make clear: I do not believe that this was Valve's intention; it is simply my explanation as to why Gordon is silent. I believe, as many others do, that Valve's reasoning behind Gordon's silence is to make him a more relatable character. I am simply providing a logical explanation for his silence. :My goodness... Well done. I commend you for taking an out-of-the-box view of why he is a silent protagonist, very good job explaining your reasoning. Maybe valve'll give us a few hints when the next games come out. (Hopefully they will..) -Kat :I do have to say, good job on the well written forum! But Valve, in my theory, wouldn't go that far giving a character autism. He may have no emotions to actions in the game, but no character in any other game would. It's not that after Eli Vance's death, he would fall onto his knees and scream "NOOOOO!" into the sky as the camera zooms up like they do in the movies. I would just find it an implicit and useless theory. But I DO have to say again, good job on the forum! And who knows, Valve might go in deeper to show Freeman's autism! --KillFeedz OG 15:44, April 10, 2012 (UTC)